Is anything outrageous?

Michel Rempel, who, in my opinion, should be running to lead the Conservative Party of Canada ~ because she is, inter alia, young, smart, socially moderate, tough on crime and terror, telegenic, fiscally conservative, and media savvy ~ is outraged by the most recent terrorist attack, this one on a church in France. She is also outraged because the most emotion Stéphane Dion can muster is to be “saddened” …

… it’s hard not to share Ms Rempel’s outrage at the lack of outrage from this government, but then we need to understand that this is what passes for foreign and defence policy in “official Ottawa” in 2016:

The Liberal government’s objective is not to give any hint of offence to anyone, ever, no matter how many casualties nor how heinous the crime. It is not clear that most or even many Canadians agree, but then it doesn’t matter because most Canadians are (relatively) unconcerned about foreign and defence policy (expect they don’t like spending on foreign aid or the military) …

… and it will stay like that until (not unless and not if, but when) there is another outrage on Canadian soil. Then the government will wring its hands and appoint a Liberal insider to study social policy.

Don’t get me wrong. I still think the best, maybe the only way to actually defeatDa’esh/ISIL/ISIS is by mounting a huge, domestic propaganda campaign that aims to rob them of the air (of indignity and profanation) that they need to further their cause, and the water (of anti-Canadian religious propaganda and popular support) in which, to paraphrase Mao Zedong, Canadian based terrorists can swim, and to isolate them overseas so that the only people they can kill are their fellow Muslims. That does not mean that we should not be more actively engaged in sending as many Da’esh/ISIL/ISIS member as we can to early graves … that’s a good, sound, sensible, Conservative foreign policy objective, but it does mean that preventing harm here, at home, in Canada requires good internal security, better immigration control and a national propaganda campaign that aims to convince (almost) all Canadians that our enlightened, secular, Anglo-Saxon, liberal, democratic (earthly) culture (society) and system of government are superior to anything else that is on offer by any country, any political party or any god, for that matter.

But, at some point, Prime Minister Trudeau and Foreign Minister Dion have to be more than “sorry” about the acts of terror committed against our allies, our friends and our neighbours.